This week's obsessions - Color blocking [pic heavy]

It has been a long time since my last obsessions post so i thought it would be the perfect time to tell you a little something about one of the trends for this S/S season and do the obsessions post. It's a killing two birds with one stone kind of a situation.

But, until we get to color blocking, i want to show you something that our middle school arts teacher/class master taught us. It's helpful, not only for the color blocking trend, but in make up as well, as i will explain below. So...there are 3 primary colors: red, yellow and blue. If you have these 3 colors, you can combine them and get whatever color you desire. Keep in mind: white and black are not colors!!! Now, moving on, if you combine the primary colors, two at a time, you get your secondary colors: orange, green and purple.

This is the drawing our teacher always made and i find it very useful. Now, let me now tell you about the complimentary colors, the combinations that always work the best. They consist in one primary color and one secondary color. Let's start with red for example, its complimentary color is green (e.g. the red tulips, don't they look stunning?), the secondary color obtained with the other 2 primary ones. Blue goes with orange, yellow with purple. So, when trying to combine colors, you can start from here and then let your imagination take over.

I've told you that this is useful for make up as well. Think about concealer...what do you use for neutralising redness? Well a green concealer of course, do you see where I'm getting at? If you take a look at the drawing, you'll notice that green and red are on opposite sides, and that's why one neutralizes the other. Or for the under-eye circles you use yellow, can't find an example for the blue-orange combination but i think you get it now. Think about Newton's law: action and reaction! Yeah yeah, I'm a physics freak i know... haha...but i can't help it :D

Another interesting fact about this drawing: if you start with red, reading the colors clockwise, add indigo between blue and purple, what do you get? The order of colors in the rainbow. Did you know that?

I'm finished with the drawing and now I'll talk about the color blocking trend. The idea is to get pieces in solid, bright blocks of color and combine them. I find it a playful trend that allows your imagination to run wild, coming up with new and interesting combinations. Think about this: have you ever thought about a color combination but didn't use it because you thought that it won't work? Well, here's perfect excuse to go back, and try it, wear it. I'll start with some runway photos, and i couldn't not include some Jil Sander and Gucci looks:

If i think about it, last S/S season it was all about neutrals, for me, and maybe a little blue here and there, but not in a very bright and bold tone. I was fed up with color and wished my closet had been fuuullll of neutral colored clothes. It went on during the F/W season as well. But, now, after seeing all that lovely combinations of colors on the fashion blogs that i follow, colors are starting to grow back on me. So, what did i do? Went by my dad's and dag in my closet for the long forgotten colored clothes. And here's what has been dug up:

Don't they look nice...all the pretty colors...in a rainbowy order...;;) Notice anything off about it? I did, i don't have anything orange! And the little rainbow of clothes is incomplete :((( I have to get something orange and some red skinny pants (the red ones i have are flared and can't wear them except with 10 cm heels, that i do not wear very often). Oh, and yesterday you might say i wore a color blocking outfit, in the pictures taken with me opening the Ivatherm package haha

I was telling you about the nice color blocking outfits overload lately, and i want to show, give you some ideas. Starting with the lovely Emilie, from My little fashion diary:

I know this might not be an everyday kind of outfit but if you're looking for an outfit that will make you stand out, this might be the perfect thing, especially here in Romania :D. I'll try to take pictures in the future with the outfit that i wore yesterday and got lots of scanning type of stares :))